Aside from speed, the other significant drawback to pen-and-paper writing, when compared to typing, is the lack of correction utilities. A loose leaf notebook doesn’t employ the magic squigglies that let us know when we have spelled something wrong, or when we have sentence fragments that were able to sneak past us our brain’s oh-so-faulty grammar check. However, European startup Lernstift is looking to bring those correction utilities to pen-and-paper.

The company’s new pen of the same name will vibrate to alert you when your handwriting has become illegible or when you’ve made a grammatical error. This will provide the same instant feedback that the magically appearing green and red squigglies do when typing in a word processor. The pen doesn’t sport a fancy display or projected lasers, but instead uses different combinations of modes and vibrations in order to provide you with corrections.

When the pen is switched to Calligraphy Mode, it will vibrate once whenever it detects an illegible letter. In Orthography Mode, the pen will vibrate once when you make a spelling error, and vibrate twice when it detects a grammatical error. The detection mechanisms work in the air as well, so you don’t have to actually put pen to paper for the correction features to function.

The Lernstift pen is composed of around $68 to $109 worth of smartphone guts, all housed within a thermoplastic (or aluminum, it’s not clear if it’s been decided yet) frame, and employs the use of motion sensors in order to detect what you’re writing. The pen is powered by Linux, and uses the data obtained from the motion sensors to look for possible errors.

Currently, two models of the pen are in production. The first model can be considered the standard version, providing the correction capabilities, but not much else. A more complex model will contain WiFi, as well as a pressure sensor to let you know when you’re pressing too hard — because sometimes we writers just write so hard. If you think you’ll be emotionally stable after a pen tells you that it can write better than you, the standard model is slated for an August 2013 release, while the more complex model is planned for a release in 2014.